


Face Time

by FHC_Lynn



Series: Broken Windows [9]
Category: Transformers - All Media Types, Transformers Generation One
Genre: Humor
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-10-27
Updated: 2016-10-27
Packaged: 2018-08-27 09:58:53
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 500
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8397196
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/FHC_Lynn/pseuds/FHC_Lynn
Summary: Responding to overwork by ignoring physical symptoms was, apparently, not the solution to Prowl's dilemma.





	

**Author's Note:**

> Prompt: Home is my castle  
> Notes: Inspired by the October Collection going on now.

When the heaviest and loudest of negotiations had been ongoing, the stress had promised to eat Prowl alive and spit bolts and struts out into the organic muck Earth called a surface. Officers scurried on both sides while Optimus and Megatron postured at and provoked one another. He scrambled to keep their respective armies from decimating either themselves or the local populace from boredom and anxiety. While he had been designed with the high stress environment of law enforcement in mind, Prowl had begun to feel both age and strain during those months. He had not been in the habit of depriving himself recharge and regular rations, if available, whatever the crew thought.

One of his primary coded directives was self-care, after all.

But when negotiations wavered and faltered, Prowl wrote as many temporary bypasses as he needed. A week of this impossible schedule later, he disabled his internal diagnostic alarms to have some silence in his head, if he could not have it in the physical plane.

After only another week, he understood why Megatron flinched when Starscream opened his mouth. Worse than that comprehension, though, Prowl thought he _liked_ Starscream, screeching aside. Working with Soundwave to keep Megatron on task, the mech was absolutely brilliant. If only because Starscream provoked Megatron more than Optimus did.

After two weeks, Prowl readjusted his stabilizers to keep himself balanced. He programmed a fifteen percent speed reduction to his movements to compensate. If Jazz had not been preoccupied with morale, Prowl expected Ratchet would have been informed.

In the third week of negotiations, while he held the latest and last plasfilm printing of their treaty out to Megatron, every joint in his frame unlocked. The pages scattered in the air, flinging themselves all over the table and Megatron. Prowl swayed in the shocked silence. Then he crumpled forward. He had an excellent view of Megatron's thighs as his processor shut down without further warning.

He woke to a dimly lit, utilitarian grey ceiling. Some idiot had left him on his auxiliary panels, and their hinges screamed beside a backlog of alerts; his diagnostic blocks were gone.

Oh, his aching processor. His aching _everything_.

"You're awake," a voice rasped from the shadows.

"For now. Am I a hostage?"

"You're a guest." A hand moved into his field of vision, holding him down when Prowl tried to sit up. "Stop. You're exhausted."

"I am also in pain. I was not designed to lay on my back."

"I'm sorry," Megatron grunted. He removed his hand, and Prowl sat up. The room was tiny and bare.

"Your guest quarters match reports of your brig," Prowl observed.

"These are my quarters."

“You brought me to your bed? What kind of guest am I supposed to be?”

In retrospect, Prowl should not have allowed himself to speak before all of his processors had come online.

Megatron stood slowly, forcing Prowl to crane his neck back to maintain eye contact. “The kind I bring home. Now don’t tempt me.”


End file.
